Professional forms for cheese are easy to use, they are perforated forms of high-quality food grade polypropylene or stainless steel. Wooden forms, once in high speed, are used less and less today.
What are the forms for home made cheese?
Manufacturers offer a wide variety of models: for semi-hard cheeses such as Russian and Kostroma with pressing and more simple forms for soft cheeses. In form they can be round, square, rectangular, cone-shaped, spherical, euroblocks.
Also there are so-called multi-forms, designed for the simultaneous production of several different in form cheeses.
Forms for pressing cheese with a piston are used for the preparation of hard and semisolid cheeses with compulsory pressing of the cheese head. Since up to 25 kg can be applied to the cheese head, the mold must be made of strong plastic or stainless steel.
The thickness of the wall of the plastic mold is usually 3 mm or more. These molds have a lid with high and round press releases. They can be round, rectangular and spherical. In fact, the mold for pressing hard and semi-hard cheeses is of no fundamental importance, rather it is a tribute to traditions.
For soft self-pressing cheeses, the shape is used with a colander, that is, with holes for draining excess liquid. They are shifted cheese mass, after which it is pressed under its weight. There is a huge variety of shapes and sizes of such devices. The smaller the shape, the faster the cheese will ripen. However, for the preparation of soft cheeses you can use the usual domestic colander or plastic containers, in which you need to drill a lot of small holes.
How to choose a form for making cheese?
If you choose the material for making cheese molds, then it's better to stop on plastic. It is lighter in weight and easier to take care of. If you are afraid that the plastic mold is fragile, then with thick walls it is absolutely not a problem.
The principal difference is in what form your cheese will be, no. Choose at your discretion a round, oval, cylindrical, rectangular or any other shape.
If you need a form under the press, consider the weight of oppression - the form must withstand it. And most importantly, that the form had a solid lid - this will determine the quality of pressing.
Many craftsmen, instead of buying ready-made forms, make them from improvised materials. And in fact, for this fit all sorts of items from household utensils.